


we're both showing hearts

by foxgloved



Category: Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Valentine's Day, canon divergent probably, implied alec/magnus, mention of past isabelle/meliorn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 17:09:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6017959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxgloved/pseuds/foxgloved
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The first time Isabelle hears about Valentine's Day, it's an offhand mention by Clary when Isabelle is still hopelessly lost in her own head pining for her.</i>
</p>
<p>(lesbianlightwood said: write me izzy finally having a mundie gf for this mundie “valentine’s day” concept and going into a highkey panic not knowing what to do for clary and going to either magnus or alec or both (or simon?? anyone u feel like writing) for help !!!!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	we're both showing hearts

**Author's Note:**

> title is from john legends 'all of me' nd give me all the cute girlfriends..........

The first time Isabelle hears about Valentine's Day, it's an offhand mention by Clary when Isabelle is still hopelessly lost in her own head pining for her. She tilts her head, and Clary stutters on whatever she's saying about Luke doing something for Jocelyn for Valentine's Day a few years back and still trying to insist his affection for her is nothing but platonic, and--

“Valentine's Day?” Isabelle asks.

“Oh-- yeah--” Clary manages, faltering at being cut off. She clears her throat, and smooths her hair back, a slow flush sliding across her face beneath the splotches of freckles. “It's a mundane holiday. Like, um, you have a valentine-- a girlfriend or boyfriend or datemate, or spouse, or even just a friend or maybe family member-- Mom was my valentine when I was five, I think, and Simon every year after. So, it's about love and kindness and relationships, and--” She scratches the back of her neck. “I don't know how to explain it, really, but basically you just-- give presents to, and show appreciation for, someone you care about.”

Isabelle considers this, and ends up shaking her head. “Your mundane traditions are odd,” she says, but with a bit of affection to it. Clary grins at her, nervous and a little relieved, too, and Isabelle asks her to tell her more about Valentine's Day. “When's Valentine's Day?” she asks, confused but intrigued by the concept.

“February fourteenth,” answers Clary. She blinks twice, and grins, still pink in the face. “Why, you want to do something for it? That's in, like...” She glances to the ceiling, eyebrow furrowing. “A couple months?”

“I might,” says Isabelle.

“Well, good luck with your fairy boyfriend,” Clary tells her, with a sudden stiffness to her shoulders, the teasing smile gone from her face.

Isabelle frowns at her as she turns, and is moving before she can think better of it, using her Shadowhunter speed to step in front of Clary. “Hey,” she says, holding out a hand to rest it across Clary's shoulder. “Where are you going? I didn't-- I wanted to talk to you more about Valentine's Day.”

Clary won't look her in the eye. “I figured, if you're just going to ask about what you should do for whatever Downworlder of the week--” She freezes, and backs up, clapping her hands over her mouth. “Oh my god, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean--” Clary huffs, and Isabelle-- doesn't think that's what she meant to say, so she tilts her head and waits for her clarification. “Oh, man, when I get... I don't know, upset or-- jealous”-- and Isabelle's heart jumps, because does that mean what she thinks it does-- “I say things I don't mean to. In case you hadn't noticed, a lot of the time, um, my temper gets the better of me.”

“I had,” Isabelle says, but she backtracks, peeling her hand off Clary's arm. “What do you mean, 'upset or jealous'? Jealous of...” She hesitates before she finishes, not wanting to slip up in her judgment-- usually she'd be confident about this sort of thing, but Clary's _face_. “Meliorn? Because, I assure you, we're not dating. I guess mundanes call it 'friends with benefits'? And we're not even _friends_ , really. Begrudging allies, maybe.”

“Oh.” Some of the weight lifts from Clary's shoulders, and she's avoiding Isabelle's gaze. “Yeah, I guess... I was a little jealous of him.”

“Why?”

“Because--” Clary's flush turns to a full-blown red, and her next words are a mumble, so low Isabelle thinks she's misheard at first: “Because I kindofreallylikeyou that's why.” Clary looks up, finally, to Isabelle's face, searching for something and-- Isabelle doesn't know if she finds it or not, but she's having difficulty closing her mouth and Clary looks down again, moving past her. “Well, I guess that's it then. Sorry--”

Isabelle reaches for her, and she's sure she's not supposed to use her super speed for _this_ but-- “Wait,” she says. “You like me?”

“Um.” Clary opens and closes her mouth. “I. Yeah. A lot.”

“I like you, too,” Isabelle says, feeling her heart give a resounding pound at saying that. Clary's eyebrows raise, and her blush settles down a little again, her fingers stretching out to curl around Isabelle's wrist-- or over her whip/bracelet-- and she gives Isabelle that searching look again. “A lot,” she echoes, lifting her fingers to pinch them in between Clary's, and rub the side of Clary's hand with her thumb. It's something her mom used to do a lot when she was a kid-- with her and her dad-- and it's a soothing motion, to both of them, Isabelle thinks.

“Oh,” Clary says, and a smile spreads across her face, slow and careful. She squeezes Isabelle's hand. “So, we're--”

“You don't have to put a label on it, if you don't want.”

“--girlfriends,” Clary finishes, scratching the side of her flushed neck with her free hand. Isabelle feels herself warm at the words-- she's never been anyone's girlfriend before, in her opinion (or any of theirs, she's sure), and it's a bit thrilling, honestly. “If you want to be?”

“Absolutely,” Isabelle says, and she leans forwards and kisses Clary's cheek, gentle and leaving a small smear of lipstick.

  


*

  


Isabelle has Valentine's Day marked on her calendar, after that, and one night as Alec's stopping by her room to ask her about something-- _something important_ , he says, but then he looks to the side before he gets whatever it is out and frowns at the heart on February fourteenth.

“What's that?” he asks.

Isabelle folds her hands over her lap, rubbing the cool metal of her bracelet. The ruby snake eyes seem to peer into her soul, and she pays no attention to this, reaching up and dusting her fingers over the necklace she wears, too. “Oh,” she says, “it's a mundane holiday Clary told me about.” Alec's eyebrows go up at that, and he leans against the wall, a silent question in his gaze. “It's called Valentine's Day--” And she explains the concept for him, pausing when she can't remember a detail and smoothing over it. She might screw up a bit of the description, but she doesn't particularly care, speaking of it with an animated excitement.

He shakes his head. “Mundanes are strange,” he says, with the same confusion it always has, and he stops, falls silent, gaze off into space.

“What were you going to ask me?”

“Um.” Fear darts across Alec's face, fleeting but there, and it's such an odd expression for him that Isabelle leans forwards, a frown settling over her previous smile. He rubs his hands together, and glances up, seeming to prepare himself for whatever it is you're about to say. “What do you do when you... think you like two people?”

“You can like more than one person, Alec,” says Isabelle. She thinks she knows who he's talking about, but-- even so, she doesn't ask, and smiles at him-- sometimes, she thinks, it's hard to believe that he's the older of them. “But I think you might want to figure out if you like them differently, and if you do-- don't let him slip out of your hands. You've seen the way he looks at you.” Alec flushes, and nods.

“Okay,” he says, and then leaves.

  


*

  


It's a day before Valentine's Day and Isabelle is panicking.

She wants to do something for Clary-- of course she does, she's her girlfriend and she deserves something nice especially with all the shit going down this week-- and she doesn't know what. She hadn't asked about what people normally did for Valentine's Day, of course, so caught up in the actual concept.

And here she is at, of all people's flats, Magnus Bane's, wondering what she's doing.

He opens the door on the second knock, odd green-gold eyes flashing, and seems to be blocking the doorway. “Yes?” he asks, practiced and low, the light in the hallway shining on the glitter smeared across his sharp cheeks.

“Would you know anything about a mundane holiday called Valentine's Day?” Oh, she hadn't meant to just blurt it out like that, but what else can she do? And Magnus's eyes glow at that.

“Do you have a valentine, Isabelle?”

“Maybe,” Isabelle says, rubbing the back of her neck. Magnus laughs at her, high, and he drums his (painted, a weaving pattern of red and pink and white that makes Isabelle dizzy to look at) nails against the chipped doorframe.

“You could buy them chocolate,” he suggests. “Or--” He snaps his fingers, and a heart-shaped red box appears out of thin air, tumbling into his palm, and he stretches it out to her. “I can.” Isabelle stares at its sparkle as she takes it, red sequins dusting off on her fingertips, and rustles it by her ear. “Get some flowers or something, or a card, I don't know. Tell _them_ ”-- and is it just her or is there a certain catch on the word-- “how much you care about them.” He glances over his shoulder. “Now, if you'll excuse me--”

Aaaaand shuts the door, as nicely as he can (which is not very), in her face.

(Well, looks like Alec had taken her advice, anyways.)

“Thank you,” Isabelle yells at the shut door.

  


*

  


She takes the chocolates, and decides not to take a card or a flower or anything because, checking out the aisles in a mundane store (without her invisibility rune, and the shopkeeper gives her a bemused look), there are just too many for her to pick from and she doesn't know what Clary would like, anyways. She finds herself knocking on Clary's door, and Clary opens up with a smile.

“Izzy,” she says, upbeat, and gives her a little kiss on the cheek. “I didn't-- did we have a date planned for tonight? Because--”

“We do now,” Isabelle says, and holds out the box of chocolates. “Can I come in?”

Clary's eyebrows raise, and she looks to the side, to the calendar on the side of her wall. “Ohh,” she says, and steps aside. She takes the chocolates, and whistles when she opens them. “These are really nice-- my mom used to get these for me. Where'd you get the money to--”

“Magnus.”

“Oh,” Clary says again.

She shakes her head, and sets the chocolates down on a side table, leaning in to give Isabelle a real kiss-- her lips are soft against Isabelle's, warm and tasting vaguely of her strawberry chapstick. She leans back, after a long moment, and her eyes shine when she looks up at Isabelle. Isabelle's always mocked people-- mundanes, mostly-- for making goo-goo eyes at each other, but now, she's sure it makes her a hypocrite.

“Happy Valentine's Day,” Isabelle tells her, with a small little grin.

“Happy Valentine's Day,” Clary says back.

**Author's Note:**

> im on [tumblr](http://npdsolo.tumblr.com/) !!


End file.
